RTV Theory and Practice - Special Issue

Because of this, Radio Zagreb’s morning programme undertook the risk of an experiment a уеаг ago, not arbitrarily but taking account of the circumstances and social conditions of our activity. For example, to the abovementioned factors such as the structure of listeners, the conditions of going to work, the level of activity at work and so on we have added a factor of an explicitly Yugoslav nature: the social position and role of the individual in self-management relations. Listeners, often considered a mere amorphous mass, have long since found their identity in the social process, and hence they must fmd it in the information system as part of that process too. This was the first premise, and the second was directly connected with it. If we have supported the social identiflcation of that mass according to its position and possibility of preparing, creating and making decisions, we have also concurred with its need for the focus of information not to be exclusively on a decision as the final act of a process, but on the very process of decision-maktng on acquaintance with the relevant information and fmally with the decision itself. The conclusion, then, was that orientation of attention can be the consequence of circumstances about which the abovementioned Soviet author could say nothing, for objective rasons, but that Yugoslav radio can and must utilize this chance, even in the early morning hours. In doing so, the morning programmes should not, ot course, ignore the traditional tried and tested features of this part of the programme. If we contend today that the feeling of risk, because of the time of day ог response of the listeners, was too great there is nevertheless the danger of a wrong choice of subject or resistance because of the habit of regarding morning programmes as a light-hearted dressing to the impending working day. But habits change. It may seem improbable to some that at 5 o’clock in the morning we have already had university professors, ministers, scientists and top political officials available for live participation. Тћеу have spoken to listeners and, if necessary, acted as competent interpreters of topical social themes. Those were mornings rich in exchanges of information, contradictions and suggestions on, for example, the new Associated Labour Act, the Criminal Code, the construction of trunk roads, the Family Code, ecological issues and so on. We have spoken of the phenomenon as well as of one experience of Radio Zagreb’s morning programme. We are sure that it can brmg new elements into our discussions on the optimal concepts and effects of the morning programme which, we are all agreed, is among the most popular not only in Yugoslavia but in the rest of the world too. We have attempted to reveal the new opportunities of the

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